Metaethical problems for ethical egoism …

1 1 Metaethical problems for ethical egoism reconsidered Benjamin Bayer July 6, 2009 Until recently it has been conventional to assume that ethical egoism is ethical is name only and that no account that considers one s own interests as the standard of moral obligation could ever count as seriously ethical . In recent years, however, philosophers have shown increasing appreciation for more sophisticated forms of egoism which attempt to define self-interest in enriched terms, terms which characterize self-interest as a form of human flourishing in both material and psychological dimensions. But philosophers are still skeptical that any conception of self-interest could underpin ethical theory. This paper considers recent arguments by Richard Joyce, who is willing to concede enriched conceptions of self-interest, but who claims that egoism cannot support intuitions about counterfactual conditionals, or paradigmatic traits and uses of moral norms.

2 I argue that ethical egoism can satisfy each of Joyce s requirements for morality, provided that it is taken to involve the very notion of enriched self-interest that Joyce is elsewhere willing to consider. In showing that egoism can count as a moral theory, I show, in effect, that Joyce s arguments for error theory about morality are really arguments for error theory about agent-neutral, non-egoistic morality. 1. Introduction For much of the last century or two, considering the viability of ethical egoism as a moral theory was a formality to be addressed merely for the sake of dismissing it. Ethics textbooks would introduce the theory that moral obligation is based on self-interest only to knock it down quickly, before getting around to the real business of evaluating the dispute between deontology and consequentialism, both of which take it for granted that moral obligation assumes a special agent-neutral moral point of view.

3 1 Part of the reason for this ready dismissal was the widespread view that the egoist is the antithesis of the moral person, on the grounds that one person s pursuit of self-interest was taken almost necessarily to involve conflicts with the interests of others, and that the job of morality is to avoid or settle such conflicts. In more recent years, it has become clearer that this dismissal relied uncritically on impoverished views of the nature of self-interest. Particularly with the advent of virtue ethical and neo-Aristotelian theories that have come to rival deontological and consequentialist approaches, self-interest has come to be viewed in a more positive light, often as a form of human flourishing, not as rapacious On more sophisticated versions of egoism , then, self-interest can be determined by reference to the objective needs of a flourishing human life, not by reference to pleasure maximization or subjective preference satisfaction (pursuers of either of which are easier to see as coming into conflict).

4 Arguably a crude version of egoism , one which defined self-interest in these more subjective terms, would not count as an ethical theory, not only because it would occasion more interpersonal conflict, but also, as we shall see, because it fails to define principles of long-term flourishing that are more characteristic of a moral 1 Footnote textbooks. 2 For recent positive treatments of self-interest, see Bloomfield (2008), Schmidtz (1997), Badhwar (1997), and Hampton (1997). For favorable treatments of self-interest in the virtue ethics tradition, see especially Hursthouse (1999, 163-191). For recent full-fledged advocates of ethical egoism , see Smith (2006), Hunt (1999), and Binswanger (1992). 3 Preference utilitarianism is, of course, a sophisticated version of the original doctrine, but applied to egoism , it would do little to eliminate the conflict of interest problem .

5 Of course, according to the sophisticated egoists, crude egoists are not really egoists at all. On the sophisticated theories, self-interest by its nature is defined by reference to the distinctive mode of flourishing of the living organism in question. As we will see, human flourishing is, itself, a sophisticated process, and as such, human self-interest is defined likewise. And it is not even obvious if any philosophers have ever 2 However controversial they may remain, recent defenses of ethical egoism have pushed the debate over its worth as a moral theory to a new level of seriousness, in which egoism is no longer viewed as an ersatz version of morality, to be dismissed only for the sake of contrast with legitimate disputes about the nature of morality.

6 Critics of egoism increasingly appreciate that assuming self-interest to imply rapacious indulgence is akin to assuming that utilitarianism implies that pushpin is as good as poetry, Mill s protestations to the contrary notwithstanding. Symptomatic of this appreciation are the contents of a new anthology edited by Paul Bloomfield, Morality and Self-Interest (2008). While many of the authors are critics of ethical egoism , few take it for granted that egoism is a matter of crude hedonism, or that there are inevitable conflicts of interest between people. Instead the focus is often on whether a code of self-interest should count as a code of Especially noteworthy, in this respect, is the contribution by Richard Joyce (2008). Joyce initially expresses skepticism about Bloomfield s own proposal that one s violation of putative moral obligations always involves the frustration of one s own self-interest.

7 But he ultimately considers the possibility that Bloomfield may be correct, and argues that even if always, for everyone, necessarily it frustrates one s self-interest to engage in acts of paradigmatic vice, and the concepts of morality and self-interest are coextensive, this does not imply the concepts mean the same thing. So there is still a serious Metaethical question as to whether the prescription to uphold moral obligations on the grounds of self-interest would count as a genuinely moral prescription. Joyce is a moral error theorist in the tradition of Mackie, and so argues elsewhere that even though ethical predicates like ..is morally good are uttered with assertoric force (contra noncognitivism), they fail to refer to anything real. In defense of this conclusion, error theorists cite unusual properties of ethical predicates such as their presuppositions about human autonomy, their reliance on inescapable categorical imperatives, their lack of explanatory value, their origins in religious or other supernatural metaphysics and claim that not all of these properties can fit into a naturalistic worldview.

8 Error theory s Metaethical perspective therefore brings with it a special attention to the meaning of ethical predicates, such that an error theorist might be in a good position to analyze egoistic prescriptions for whether they count as genuinely ethical . Joyce, of course, recognizes that error theory s conception of what is essential to ethical predicates is controversial. Even error theorists differ amongst themselves about what it is that is so peculiar about advocated crude egoism as an ethical theory. Thrasymachus was, perhaps, the prototype of an egoist, and perhaps sophists of his day held similar views.

9 It is interesting, however, how Thrasymachus himself takes his view as a rejection of justice, not as an egoistically-grounded theory of justice, underscoring that crude egoism is of course not an ethical theory. An oft-cited example is Hobbes, but his is a psychological rather than an ethical egoism (and it is spectacular how many philosophers confuse these two when looking for a target for ethical egoism ). Nietzsche is a better candidate for an authentic historical ethical egoist whose view verges on crude egoism . To the extent that it does verge on the crude, however, it is once again noteworthy how Nietzsche himself embraces his view as a rejection of morality. When Nietzsche is less crude, he himself speaks of the virtues of the higher type of man (such as as the gift-giving virtue.)

10 Generally, it is sometimes embarrassing how critics of egoism have to manufacture targets of their critique, by appealing to the crude theory, when it is not clear if any such targets exist. The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy entry on egoism , characteristically enough, lists only one actual philosophical advocate of ethical egoism in its bibliography, Jesse Kalin (1970). 4 Throughout this piece, I use moral and ethical interchangeably. 3 ethical predicates. Nevertheless, Joyce thinks there should be a level at which error theorists and non-error theorists alike should be able to agree upon some necessary conditions for counting as an ethical predicate. Owing to this agreement, anybody whether error theorist or not should be extremely uncomfortable about any proposal to identify moral imperatives and values with prudential imperatives and values (Joyce 2008: 61).